I need help with files on a cd that won't open?

I have a cd for school that has all kinds of printable files on it. The main page opens up in an internet explorer window just like you've gotten on the internet but you're really not. Some of the files open as a pdf. The problem is that the cd works perfectly on my desktop, but not on my laptop where I really need it work. It will open some of the files but not all of them. The particular part I'm having problems with this one file that on my desktop when I click on that file it show the list of all the papers that I can open and they open in the internet explorer just fine. But, when I try the exact thing on my laptop, the file is empty. It doesn't make sense. What am I missing? I've reinstalled internet explorer 7, I've even tried downloading firefox and I've ran my updates by nothing seems to help.